


Separate Ways

by ilyena_sylph, Merfilly



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-17
Updated: 2014-03-17
Packaged: 2018-01-16 01:32:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1326805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilyena_sylph/pseuds/ilyena_sylph, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Slade tried to push Rose away, Wintergreen stood by his choice to take the girl on instead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Separate Ways

**Author's Note:**

  * For [irismustang](https://archiveofourown.org/users/irismustang/gifts).



> This was the opening to a serial format AU that has yet to be completed.

Title: Separate Ways (Part One)  
CoWriter: 

Slade had known by the look on Wintergreen's face when he said Steel was taking Rose to the Titans that this fight wasn't nearly over. Wintergreen had stopped for the moment, but when his old friend wanted something badly, it rarely stopped at just one fight. He hadn't been there (had been too far away, damn his brother to the lowest pits of hell) when Rose had lost her mother. Wintergreen had been there, and... he'd obviously bonded closely with the child. Away from Steel, now, and with a few moments of down-time, he could hear his old friend's footsteps coming towards the bedroom.

"Slade." Wintergreen already had a tone of argument in his voice, before he even stepped into the room. He was not going to let that child suffer with strangers. He wasn't much more than one himself, but he had been there for the worst of her losses, and she had seemed willing to accept his comfort. 

"Yes, Wintergreen?" Slade turned towards him, letting his head tip to the side a little as he looked at his oldest friend, waiting to hear which arguments he would use this time. Not that he meant to be moved on this -- it wasn't safe for her to be around him. 

"You're wrong this time." //You've been wrong before, but this...this is as wrong as not telling Adeline.//Yes, he had been culpable in that... all the more reason not to allow Slade's foolishness to rule the matter this time. "That child needs family. She's been through hell and then some." Wintergreen remained in the doorway, jaw set tight. //And you know it, you fool of a boy.// 

Slade bit lightly into the inside of his lip before he answered, not letting the anger and the disappointment in Wintergreen's expression change his mind. "You told me yourself that Lili didn't want her near me, Wintergreen. And this is no life for a child, even one she raised."

"That's no reason to bar me from her!" Wintergreen snapped. "I've been taking care of her since this started, Slade. And as you have no interest in being slowed down by an old man any longer, I could quite easily settle into rearing her."

"You _know_ that's not true!" Slade snapped right back at him, refusing to give voice to the rest of the thought. //That I'm afraid for you is _not_ the same as not wanting you slowing me down!//

"It does not change the truth, Slade. I am old. I had reasons to steer clear of my own children, but she has been orphaned by her entire life!" The older man glared long and hard at his former student. "I wish to raise her."

Slade closed his eye against the furious look, listening to Wintergreen's heartbeat and thinking about the situation. He didn't want her near him, he'd gotten everyone els-- He stopped, cold, and opened his eye to look at Wintergreen. He set all of his mind to memorizing his best friend's face, the lines of his body, the expression written in green eyes gone hot, all of the protective anger that he'd seen for himself so many times blazing all through him. He looked for long moments at the only person who'd been with him no matter what, who'd survived Wade's rampage by some damned _miracle_... He wanted to believe it was because Wintergreen had been with him, but that just made laughter echo in the back of his mind. //And how many times did being with you nearly get him killed?// 

That was true. If he wanted Rose away from him so that she would be safe, in the aftermath of all of this, not knowing if Wade was alive or dead... The same logic about why pushing Rose away was the only right thing to do -- applied here, too. Wintergreen would be better off and in less danger far away from him, as well. The thought hurt more than he'd expected.

"Slade." Wintergreen modulated his tone, to the softer, supportive one for reaching out that had always worked best to gentle Slade down. "Don't do this to her. Don't place her among strangers that live such dangerous lives themselves."

Slade took a breath, and another, trying to keep his thoughts off his face, and nodded slowly. "All right, Wintergreen. I think she'd be better off with other gifted teens, but I also can't say you're wrong."

"I can handle what gifts she acquired from you, Slade. And teach her in the vein I am sure Lili already was." Wintergreen watched Slade carefully, unsure of this. He had expected to argue for some time, perhaps even use emotional leverage if necessary. Slade's sudden acquiescence to anything rarely boded well.

Slade let his lips quirk rather than show what he was actually thinking, and asked dryly, "You handled me for years, after all?" If he was feeling calm enough to joke, after all, Wintergreen would settle out of that wary tension. 

Wintergreen snorted, slowly relaxing from his tense, wary pose at the joke. "No one, Slade, truly handles you unless you wish it."

Slade snorted, shaking his head a little and thinking about the young man he'd been, and just who'd handled him entirely adroitly for years. Wintergreen underestimated his own abilities.

"So we will talk to Sarge Steel on the morrow?" Wintergreen asked.

"I'll call him," Slade nodded.

"Thank you, old friend, for being reasonable on this." He turned to go back to his own room now that the argument was over.

Slade just smiled at his back, watching him leave.

* * *

Once he was well and certain sure that Wintergreen was well out of hearing range, he called Steel.

After two rings, the phone was picked up. "Wilson?"

"Can you shift Rose's custody to Wintergreen? You weren't planning on handing that over to Harper, I know."

"With his track record?" There was a very rude noise. "Feel sorry enough for the kid he's got. Nah, looking for a family for her. But you'd rather let the old man take it?"

"There are reasons he stayed away from his own family, Steel." Slade wasn't about to discuss either British opinions of professional soldiers, he and Wintergreen's often complicated relationship, or Wintergreen's own history with a Checkmate agent, despite that it was all true. Steel didn't need any of that leverage. "But he's right, she shouldn't be with strangers. He'll take good care of her."

Sarge Steel considered it on his end. No matter what Wilson thought, her identity was going to be a problem no matter where he hid her. She was too obviously his kid, in some ways. Wintergreen had certainly proved the best of Wilson's network, staying alive the way he had, and for as long as he had. "Alright. I'll draw up guardianship papers from the lawyers."

"Good. Anything _else_ you need done, while you're doing me a favor?"

There was a laugh. "Don't worry, Wilson. I've got plenty on tap for you. Let you use those skills and keep you out of the press for awhile, how about that?"

//Another government contract, and you take tha--// Slade tried not to think about Squirrel, about what he'd said after the last government job, and that he wasn't there to pick up the .4-- He forced the thought away, settling on business. "Out of the press I can agree with, and we already handled the contract end of things. You shouldn't need me for any of those papers, right?"

"You already signed away your legal rights on her to me, so no."

"What I thought. See you when you turn something up for me." Slade hung up, and moved over to the small desk, fishing through it for a pad of paper and a pen.

He found them after a few moments, and sat down, thinking for a while before he set the pen to the paper. With the quick, decisive script he'd used all his life, he started putting words down.

_Old friend. You were right. She does deserve to have family, and she obviously had come to care for you. I took you from one family already. I won't stand in the way of this one. Take care of her. She's going to need you, if she's anything like me. Be safe._

His hand hesitated, a million thoughts chasing their way through his mind, a faint dot of ink placed at the top of the line as he struggled for what to say, but when he picked his hand up again, none of the thoughts flowed onto the ink.

_Slade._

It didn't take long to put the few things he needed out of this place together in silence, or to leave the page laying next to the tea kettle under one of his blades just before he did. Not one that had been a gift, however. He wasn't going to take the symbolism that far.

* * *

Wintergreen was not surprised that he could not hear Slade when morning had him prowl to the kitchen for a cup of tea. He was accustomed to rising first, getting breakfast on for them, all the domestic niceties of life out of field camps.

His eyes, however, noted the knife with a sense of dread the moment that he stepped into the kitchen. What, he wondered, had happened? He walked over to pick it up, looking at the note. On the first read, he could feel only shock. On the second, he felt his temper rising, until he had to contain himself from testing the throwing weight and balance on the knife.

"Slade, you bloody, asinine, difficult man...when I lay on eyes on you again..." Wintergreen cut himself off. Rose, after all, had to be his first priority. Besides, for all Slade had occasionally tried to spare his feelings, this did make it good and clear that Slade did not trust him any longer to hold his own protection up.

* * *

Getting Rose into custody proved easy; Sarge Steel wanted them both out of the firing line. The only thing remaining, once he had explained to Rose what was going on, was that Wintergreen didn't have any clear idea where to live. Africa had been home for some time, but... Slade's latest tantrum was making the older man loathe to return there. 

England was flat out. His mother had passed on, he'd never been close to his sisters, and his prat of a son in the House of Commons was enough to keep him out of London proper. Let alone his daughters.

New York did have the appeal of help close at hand. For all that the Titans were a danger to themselves, if trouble arose, they would come. Logan would, at least, and bring Stone and Harper with him. There was that small place he had rented some time back, when he needed a place other than the penthouse, when Slade was being particularly difficult to live with. 

"Rose, my girl, would New York be a trouble for you to live in?"

Rose looked at him for a little while, thinking about if she could stand to live in New York again, with all of the memories it held, then shook her head. "No... I know the city pretty well. At least it's familiar."

"It is at that," Wintergreen murmured. "Well, that is where we'll go. I have a flat... may need some tidying, but it is mine." There was a stress on the possessive, one that matched the tension she had seen around his eyes and mouth ever since they began the process of him taking over her custody.

Rose moved over and laid a hand on his shoulder, looking up at the hard expression on his face worriedly. "I don't mind cleaning. Wintergreen?" she put a gentle question in her voice, the way she had heard her mother do so often. She'd been glad when Steel told her, when he arrived, but... she wasn't sure what was upsetting him -- entirely. 

He covered her hand with his own, managing a small smile for her. "We'll get by, my dear. We will." That his heart was in shambles over this, that he was still angry at her father, and that he felt adrift in life outside of caring for her, he did not say.

"Of course we will," she smiled back at him, and did not ask where her father was, just as she had not when he arrived. She remembered what he'd said about not wanting her entirely well. What she wasn't sure she understood was why Wintergreen was here, given how close they had seemed, those moments she had seen them.

* * *

It hadn't actually taken all that long for the knowledge that Wintergreen had settled into the New York flat to reach Slade's ears... and it only took finishing Steel's latest project for him to slip into the city. He knew he wouldn't beat Wintergreen's security systems at tight range, but within the city, there was only so much he could reasonably set up and not have it going off all hours of the day and night. That gave him more than enough leeway to work around... and though he wasn't likely to find something someone could use as an attack route, if he did -- they had friends in common, still. One or two of them he would even trust with a warning message.

He ghosted past, dressed in a set of civilian clothing Wintergreen wouldn't know, staying away from the sensors -- everything looked tight. That check done to his satisfaction, he pulled back and found an inconvenient to access rooftop with a decent view over, just to be certain... and to see them if he could. 

He did not have too long to wait, as Wintergreen and Rose appeared from the direction of the fresh market. He was carrying two bags to her one, and they appeared to be conversing intently. The older man had the casual awareness of his surrounding that came so easily to veterans, and Rose was showing signs of picking it up, with glances around that were far more obvious than the ex-SAS man's.

//Still learning,// the thought was affectionate at his daughter's attempts as he kept himself from being skylined with the ease of practice, and just watched the two of them until they disappeared into the building. Then his eye lifted to their windows. Sandwiched lexan glass, he already knew -- and the thought was a comfort -- which was why the curtains were being flipped back within the time frame he'd expected. Wintergreen hated not being able to see his surroundings.

He could see as they moved about the kitchen, putting things away before Wintergreen started showing her the way to prepare the vegetables and meat for their dinner. He was apparently teaching her both sides of his life, that of combat readiness and that of the able caretaker. As old-fashioned as Wintergreen could be, that was no real surprise.

They were both safe, and obviously settling well into life, he told himself sternly, trying not to think about the meal he could tell Wintergreen was preparing. He had work to do, still. A private job down in the Central American countries that wasn't going to wait too much longer was waiting. Despite that knowledge, it took long minutes before he could make himself move from watching the two of them and slip off that rooftop, down and away into the tunnels to talk to the Salvagion crew about a few things. Wade hadn't known about them, but they were useful allies in the city, limited as their abilities Above might be.

* * *

Wintergreen knew there were limits to what he could teach Rose on the physical level. She had the wits to take all the ideas of strategy, spying, tactics, and the like from him, but when it came to the physical side of things, he was over-matched.

Not that he did not pass to her several useful techniques. His many years of running with Slade, and the few times he had been forced to use physical force against his friend, had taught him plenty on how being the weaker fighter did not necessarily mean defeat.

In needing someone who could hone Rose's gifts fully, though, Wintergreen made a judgment call. First, he turned to Steel's pet Titan team. If there was a man alive more gifted than Roy Harper Jr. with ranged weaponry, Wintergreen had yet to meet him. Donna Troy, for all her faults, did know a wide array of martial skills beyond those of the bow and gun.

But the Titans team lacked a solid hand-to-hand fighter on the level that Wintergreen knew Rose could attain. The one fighter best suited to teach her was a young man that had been an unwitting-at-times, and unwilling-at-others student of her father. Wintergreen wanted Dick Grayson for this aspect of Rose's training, and only Slade Wilson had ever managed to balk him often once he chose to follow a course.

* * *

Dick frowned at the number showing on the caller id. He hadn't been bothered by trouble from _that_ corner of his life in a long while. Still, better to know all the pieces... "Wintergreen?"

"Yes, Grayson."

"What's _he_ done now? I thought he was playing by the rules." The minute the words were out, Dick got the impression he might just have mortally offended the Brit. It wasn't that anything was distinctly said, but he had heard that controlled breathing and polished politeness from Alfred quite often, and usually after Bruce had been _really_ bone-headed.

"This matter is of no concern to the person you mean." Wintergreen paused, letting it sink in, Dick supposed, before continuing. "I know you are a busy man, but I have a proposition to put to you. Care to come to New York long enough to enjoy a meal in my home?"

Dick considered. His class load at the Academy was heavy, but not that bad. And Wintergreen had his curiosity up. He wanted to know why Slade's man-at-arms would possibly want anything to do with him, without it involving Slade at all.

"Thursday night sound good? And should I bring anything?"

"That sounds quite promising, and no. I will have everything."

Dick let the conversation end on polite niceties, and then stared at the closed phone. Just what was Wintergreen doing, when Slade Wilson was only running visibly on the orders of Checkmate?

* * *

It was pure happenstance that Slade Wilson passed through New York on the night in question. Sheer chance, he told himself, that he was in position to see the former leader of the Teen Titans arrive in civvies and be let into the building.

He was curious for half a heartbeat. Then Slade realized just what his old friend was doing, and he felt yet another tear in his heart, as well as a burning curiosity.

Wintergreen choosing Dick Grayson to teach Rose made sense, but despite his distancing, Slade would really have loved to see those lessons being given.

* * *

Rose threw her escrima sticks down in frustrated anger. "I am a better fighter than this!"

Wintergreen held his peace. Seven sessions in, now, and he had been expecting this for the last couple of sessions. Lily had arranged for Rose to be taught by the best she could buy, but Nightwing was in a class all his own. 

"You are a good fighter," Dick began with more patience than any twenty-odd-year-old should have. "But, Wintergreen picked me to teach you because I mainly use a style that's unconventional, hard to predict, and because I'm pretty good at it just to bring out the rest of your potential."

Rose glared at him, then shot a recalcitrant look at her guardian. "I learned every move you showed me, but still I can't touch you! You're holding back on my side of the lessons!" she accused Dick when she looked back at him.

"No, dear girl, you are," Wintergreen called out to her, unwilling to let Dick have to face her misplaced anger any longer. "You have the skill base. You have a frighteningly high potential. You regularly hold your own against Troy. Now, apply it and let yourself see the fight properly against Grayson."

Rose flushed, while Dick weighed the old man's words. He agreed that Rose was capable of a great deal, but what did the old Brit see that would allow Rose to work into Dick's own level?

"Come on, let's just work through forms," Dick suggested, scooping up the fighting sticks and handing them back to her. She took them, but her gaze lingered on the old man that she had learned to respect and love like the father she had never truly had. If he believed in her, she had to live up to it.

Dick stepped beside Rose, and they walked through the forms that Richard Dragon had taught him. Rose blanked her mind to all but the move, shift, hold and found a certain peace in the rhythmic motions. When they had finished the basic forms, Dick faced her again, eyebrow arched up in invitation. Rose nodded, and the fighters exploded into motion.

Dick was aerial, light, springing from point to point, a hand or foot out in strike or block, sticks weaving in hypnotic fashion. Rose could and did meet that when it was the only way, but she was grounded, anchored, finally seeing that it was necessary to complement the style thrown at her by being its opposite in many ways.

Stick against stick, wrist blocking foot, leg entangling legs became the natural parts of the scene only Wintergreen was able to witness. He could see it as Dick Grayson pushed the levels higher, with the bout lasting longer than any previous attempt at freestyle sparring had. The old Brit watched, catching a glimpse of his fosterling's face in the fighting.

What he saw was a girl not quite aware of externals beyond the fight. A total focus on the man training her had replaced all other distractions, and Dick was getting to see what Wintergreen had already suspected. The girl was made to fight, born to superior abilities because of her father, her genes contaminated at conception by the serum that had made Slade Wilson into Deathstroke.

Rose felt the concentration narrow, completely aware of every muscle twitch in her opponent. Each move that Dick launched at her was countered, blocked, turned away, but none of her own were getting through either. With such total concentration, she never even realized she was moving into an opening that was between the seconds to tag Dick with a solid blow until it was done, and the contact threw off her concentration. She took a hit, before Dick realized she was out of rhythm, and dropped back.

"What is it?" he asked her.

"I saw the hole."

"That's what you're supposed to do," he said, an infectious grin on his face.

"I saw it before it was there."


End file.
